


friction

by heatherchandlers



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Canon Era, M/M, idk what to tag this, weird freaky death power thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-13
Updated: 2016-11-13
Packaged: 2018-08-30 18:13:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8543827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heatherchandlers/pseuds/heatherchandlers
Summary: He was struck by the passion and fire of this student. He has never wanted to touch anyone more.





	

**Author's Note:**

> woah woah woah this is like a shatter me rip off there's death and hand holding and yeah . have fun

Grantaire didn't find out about what he could do until he was 4. That was a terribly young age to be holding a dying cat in your hands. Yet, the boy felt ecstatic as the energy of the cat crawled over his arms like warm honey. From anyone else watching it would seem morbid, but for tiny young Grantaire, whenever he held something and took its life, it filled him with pleasure, as if he had eaten a full dinner after years. 

When he was 9, he began getting bullied by the other boys. Once a boy had cornered him, baring crooked teeth and Grantaire took the risk of clamping his hand over the kid's scrawny wrist. He bolted immediately when the boy began to convulse erratically. He heard from the other kids that the boy had lost a lot of his memory, and Grantaire sobbed uncontrollably when he went to sleep that night. And of course, his father was out, and he had never known his mother, so no one was there to hear him. 

At 14, Grantaire had broken his promise not to touch any other living thing. But on one orange afternoon, when turning a corner, he had found a dying bird laying in the ground, white feathery wings twitching. Grantaire had kneeled down, and hesitated to hold it. He thought to himself, 'I'll only fix it's position. That won't hurt it'. 

Grantaire's hands were always clumsy, and he remembered holding it for a heart beat too long. The sickly sweet taste returned to the back of his mouth. He flinched away from it, as if stung. Feeling the familiar heat go up his arms made a wave of guilt clash with a wave of pleasure and tears swam in his vision at how overwhelming it all was for him. He got up and ran as fast as he could.

At 17, Grantaire had began wanting to touch people intimately. He wanted to know the pleasure that came from love and passion, instead of the buttery warmth he got from taking the energy out of living things. 

(One night, the room was shaking from the alcohol and he remembered a particularly sticky kiss, and he remembered the scream right after that had sliced him into pieces).

Years later, when he was a young man, he always set up barriers between people. He always said that he didn't like physical contact and most people respected that, but there were some people who just got too close, that he held his breath when they brushed his hands (though he knew that it took more than a second for the pain to start).

When he was a man, who had already learned all the ways to maneuver around any physical contact, he had wandered too close to a cafe. He remembered hearing a man speak passionately about a republic, and when he entered, sitting quietly in the back, he was struck by the passion and fire of this student. He has never wanted to touch anyone more. 

The more Grantaire came to the meetings, the more he wanted to run his hands through the boy's hair. The more they argued, the more Grantaire wanted to run his fingers down his back. The first meeting, he had learned the speaker's name was Enjolras, and Grantaire found himself whispering himself that name all the way home.

One day, when he was 29, and the year was 1832, he found himself in front of soldiers, turned to Enjolras. "Do you permit it?" He had asked gently, holding out his hand. Enjolras smiled, and pressed his hands into his.

Grantaire's souls burst into flames and radiant beams of light right when the bullets were shot, and he died, holding the hand of the person he had wanted to hold most in his life.


End file.
